Honey Bee Life Cycle

The honey bee life cycle goes through 4 basic stages. More detail is added in the diagram below, but the key stages are:

Egg

Larva

Pupa

Adult

All
bee life cycles
go through these stages, although there are great variations between the
life cycles of solitary, honey and bumblebees, (as explained elsewhere
on my site - see links.

But for now, let’s focus on the honey bee life cycle. Here's my little drawing giving an overview (you can download a larger PDF version below):

Unlike
bumblebee colonies, honey bee colonies can survive the winter, provided
they have enough food resources, are able to keep sufficiently warm,
and are free of diseases and predators. However, in the winter,
colonies are smaller than in the summer: there are no drones, and
perhaps part of the colony left the hive (in a swarm) to form a new nest
elsewhere.

Some of the workers will of course, die naturally, including during the
winter months (this is 'normal winter mortality' - note I'm not
referring to what is called
Colony Collapse Disorder
). There may be up to 20,000 workers left, and a queen.

The
queen and the rest of the colony will form a cluster to keep warm
during the cold months. There will be no brood to tend to, and no eggs
are laid during this time. However, as the days begin to warm up, and
the flowers begin to bloom, honey bees will begin to go out foraging
again, and the queen honey bee will begin to lay eggs.

After
3 days, eggs hatch into worker larvae. During this stage, each larva
will be fed about 1,300 times a day! They are fed by worker bees that
have the specific task of tending the brood, and are referred to as the
‘brood nurses’.

The food given is made from pollen, honey and
secretions from the brood nurses, and is called ‘bee bread’. (Find out
more about
bee bread
).

Potential honey bee queens, however, are given ‘royal jelly’, a much richer food.

After about 6 days, the egg cells are capped, and each larva spins itself a cocoon and becomes a pupa.

Worker bees take 10 days to emerge from pupae. Drones take slightly longer. New Queens, however, take about 6 days.

For How Long do Honey Bees Live?

The life spans of honey bees can vary greatly, depending on their function in the colony, and when they emerged in the season.

Drones may live just a few weeks,
or they could live up to 4 months. Drones that mate with new honey bee
queens, will die immediately after mating. Poor things!

By
the end of the summer, they will no longer be needed by the colony.
Honey bees need reasonable weather to forage, and of course, during the
winter time, there is far less nectar and pollen available. Drones do
not collect pollen or nectar, and those still alive will be killed by
the workers, so that winter food resources are not drained! Learn more
about
drones
.

Workers:

Workers raised in the spring and
summer have shorter, busier lives, and may live 6 or 7 weeks. This is
the most productive time for the colony, with larvae to be fed, nectar
and pollen to be gathered, and honeycomb to be built.

Those
raised in the autumn will have far less to do, with no brood to care
for. Their main concern will be to survive the cold until the following
spring. However, they may live 4 to 6 months.

Whereas
the queen honey bee life cycle revolves primarily around mating and
laying eggs, the life of worker honey bees progresses through various
stages of functions within the colony.

Queen Honey Bees:

A productive queen, favoured by the
colony and free from disease should certainly live for about 2 yrs, but
could live for up to 3 or 4 years, partly depending on whether the
beekeeper decides to get rid of the queen, or whether the colony decide
to replace her. The act of deposing the queen by the colony is called
‘supersedure’. Learn more about the role of the
Honey Bee Queen.

The diagram below give you an idea how large the queen is, in comparison with the workers and drones.

So this has given you a brief summary of the honey bee life cycle, but
you can learn a lot more about some of the specific stages, such as
swarming, by exploring the site further.